Lantry

"I'm sure I could decipher that in a few hours' time. Don't NEED my hands free, but... I think better when not tied to a post. I know, I'm weird that way."

 is one of the companions. He is an older gentleman with the quills, ink vials, and parchment scrolls one finds on the Sages of the School of Ink and Quill. Ink smudges cover his cheeks, temples, and ears. His clothes appear charred, and between the rips of the fabric you spot burn scars along his arms.

Background
Lantry is a Sage of the School of Ink and Quill. He’s a man of letters and numbers, a student of magic and nature, and an archivist obsessed with the accurate accounting of important people and events. His school is famous throughout the Tiers for amassing knowledge from all throughout the known world, but the Sages are even more famous for rarely sharing this treasure trove of learning with outsiders, despite their claims of preserving knowledge for the betterment of mankind. The Sages revel in knowing a little bit about everything, and Lantry is no exception – in his long years he’s learned the Sage’s traditional Preservation magic, as well as the arts of Healing and Concealment – styles of magic long ago pilfered from other Schools and Guilds that the Sages now boast as their own. As a student of history, Lantry has a certain adoration for Kyros. No one has the power to define the unfolding march of events quite like the Overlord – nobody in recorded history even comes close.

Vellum Citadel
When asked about his life's story, Lantry will explain that he was born in Sunder in 347 TR, right after it declared independence from the Realm of Stalwart. His parents were harbor hands - mother never returned from a voyage and father lost his hand to infection and decided to sell Lantry to the School of Ink and Quill for three bronze rings. Unlike other Sages, Lantry never picked a fancy name for himself and stuck to his commoner name.

As a novice, Lantry was assigned to the dovecotes, where he learned how to raise and groom birds to carry missives - and most of his early tomes are on that subject. It turned out that he's a particularly good bird breeder. Though he worked on a broad array of subjects, including magic, birds, language, and geometry, his real love came to him after ten years at the Citadel: He was selected for training in sigils and magic, making it possible for him to work in the field. Ever since he learned sigils around the turn of the century, Lantry used his arcane training to witness history where it happens, as it happens – for him, magic is a tool to gain access to the battlefields, backroom dealings, and hidden ceremonies that most have to read about after the fact. For Lantry and other Sages driven on this pursuit often seem to live very long lives – a fact most Sages will laugh away as the byproduct of loving your work, but is in truth the mystic side effect of decades of use and practice of Preservation magic. Writing down these events and contributing to the Chronicle, the running archive-of-all-things built over the ages through the long work of hundreds of Sages, has been his life's work ever since. He's responsible for binding five tomes altogether.

If pressed, Lantry will explain that the truth is more complicated. He was actually on the take from the Voices of Nerat, sent to the School of Ink and Quill thirty years back, before the invasion of the Tiers entered planning stages. He caught Nerat's eye when he swindled one of its loyal agents. Captured and brought before the creature, Lantry was tortured by making him stand for eight days straight. When he finally broke, Nerat dispatched him to the School alongside one other agent, whose sole purpose was helping Lantry integrate and act as a patsy should Lantry be in danger of being discovered. Lantry's mission was to act as a mole, and then changed to engineering a situation where the Vellum Citadel would flip to Kyros without a drop of blood. He failed in his task, as militant and defiant minds of the Tiersmen under Provost Sage Chiasmus prevailed. The Sages fortified their library stronghold of the Vellum Citadel in defiance of the Overlord. Lantry escaped the Citadel before the Edict was proclaimed (but not before he set all his best birds to flight before the Edict, Tern of Phrase, Constant Caw, and the rest - and hopes to start a new dovecote when things quiet down), narrowly avoiding a death in a lava-soaked ruin.

A Sage's life
After the Edict's proclamation, Lantry fled the Contested Lands towards Vendrien's Well. He was convinced that the declaration of surrender made by Apex's forces was sincere. Unfortunately, the insurgency erupted just as he was crossing the mountains, arriving in the Valley on Seventh of "Sparring" (likely Healer's Day, 2nd of Tempering). The Vendrien Guard apprehended him and a group of other Sages as they moved through the Valley and pressed them into service. The other Sages happily supported the oathbreakers, while Lantry reluctantly accepted his role as a hired quill (he considers defiance to be a slow suicide). He was essential to the insurgent operations: They had several noble-born in their ranks, and they were literate - problem is, they've come from noble houses scattered across the Realms, each with their own private script. The Sages are familiar enough with all the regional scripts to translate and coordinate. Of course, Lantry didn't resign himself to a measly challenge like that. The old citadel that served as the center of the insurgency was a crumbling affair and it seemed a crime not to put his Preservation magics to work on preserving the structure.

As a result of his qualifications, he knows quite a bit about the inner workings of the insurgency, including the fact that they have no real organization. The suicidal stand against Kyros is an attempt to inspire the Tiers to rise up against the overlord. He also knows that the key driving force are captains who never turned themselves in after Apex's surrender, who instead bid their time hiding supplies and recruiting supporters across the valley. He wound up in Chorus custody when the patrol that escorted him to his usual messaging spot was jumped by a Chorus force. He tried to flee, but a young recruit tackled him. Imbibing several of his inks to knock himself out, Lantry has been lashed to the post at the Scarlet Chorus camp ever since, almost enjoying the experience thanks to the overdose of inks.

That's the situation the Fatebinder finds him him - and sure enough, Lantry seizes the opportunity to liberate himself from hell when he realizes that he can translate the encrypted message intercepted with Variah Kel's... Aid. If liberated, he will aid the Fatebinder by chronicling their affairs and gathering lore. To this end, he learned to make his own inks to never run of writing material, and practices centering stance and drawing whenever possible to sketch what he sees with ever increasing levels of accuracy.

Recruitment

 * Lantry is found at the Scarlet Chorus camp, tied to a post and tortured. He is a hired quill that served the Vendrien Guard rebels as a contractor. Now that his contract expired, he's available to hire - provided someone can cut him down. See Taking the Outer Valley for more details.
 * It's possible to avoid having to do the trial by combat, by using Lore 32 to point out that you can take him on as your vassal and then Athletics 32 to convince Fifth Eye that you are in the right.
 * Notably, if you don't fight for him as Champion or order him cut down, he will be taken to the Voices of Nerat.

Quests

 * The Bronze Thief and Artifact Hunter: With Loyalty 1, Lantry will offer his services to secure the torchkey from Flatfoot Ferris, by drugging him (apparently, simply shaking Lantry's hand gets people high).
 * Truth and Reconciliation, Annal Sects: These are Lantry's special personal quests available in Acts 2 and 3 respectively.

Combat role

 * ''See talents for a complete breakdown of 's talents.

Lantry is built as an efficient support character and a jack-of-all-trades. As both a veteran Sage and learned traveller, he has not two, but three talent trees allowing in-depth customization. He's primarily a ranged fighter, favoring a set of custom iron throwing knives, etched like writing quills. He's designed to be able to fill almost any spot in the support and ranged combat structure with each of his trees. Preservation focuses on supporting allies, buffs, healing, and reviving them, Sage at using spells and abilities to debuff and cripple enemies, while the Quill tree turns him into a lethal marksman.

In practice, since Lantry can achieve the highest Lore scores in the entire game (even beyond the Fatebinder), he's most well suited to the role of a mage. Focus on damage-dealing spells and use spell creation to equip him with the best possible spells and you'll start noticing increasing returns once you get over the initial hump. As a mage, Lantry is extremely versatile, whereas ranged attacks tend to boil down to Quillfire - and even then, its long cooldown makes it a one trick pony at best, even with all the elemental bonuses applied.

Other interactions

 * Lantry is a scribe and so he will chronicle all of your efforts and accomplishments. In practice, this will mean that he will interject regularly making notes and remarking on events that unfold. He is, in a way, an elderly Arcade Gannon with less sarcasm and more pragmatism. He can offer plenty of background information on various aspects of the world.
 * With Subterfuge 51, you can examine Lantry's backstory closely and learn that he was, in fact, an agent of Kyros sent by Voices of Nerat to infiltrate the Vellum Citadel thirty years before the present day. The goal? Slowly win the Sages over, so that they surrender without bloodshed.
 * As a scribe, he's constantly recording everything that happens around him, including your exploits, reminders, everything. When out of parchment, he scribbles on himself. Notably, he makes his own inks which have additional, uh, medicinal properties. Cerulean, for example, acts as a stimulant (up to the point of insomnia), while red ink is a hallucinogen. Lantry will even share his drugs inks with you, if you ask politely (and reached loyalty level 3). These inks pass through the skin and into your bloodstream.
 * Red ink gives the sensation of cherry and alcohol, before creating a quiet and warm taste in your thumb: The wind blows blue, across your body as your skin tingles with triangular, pointed sensation. Lantry chuckles, the hearty guffaw sounding green, leathery, and mildewy to yours ears. Your fingers itch with a salty, rusty flavors - tasting at the air, feeling like ten tongues. Cupping your hand to your forehead, your fingers are deafened by the smell of your voice, boring through the muscles of your hand, deep into the bone.
 * Cerulean ink is blue, viscous, and leaves a chalky taste. It gives you a flood of thoughts, including seditious ones:
 * "Did you know that, legally speaking, my word is the same as Tunon's word unless the Archon contradicts my word as a Fatebinder? Rhogalus says the legal term for that is Proxy Decisis. Calio says the legal term is 'fuck you, I'm the law.'"
 * "What is Kyros' problem? Can't get off your damn throne and actually visit your subjects? How do we know Kyros isn't already dead? Or it's like a title that gets handed off to mother-to-son. I spend three years slogging through the Tiers for this ass and you know what - I don't REALLY know if Kyros exists!"
 * "Like a double-edged sword?! Why is that used as a simile for something that can hurt you when you use it? You don't actually hit your enemy, then yourself, then hit your enemy, then yourself... unless you're an idiot. Sure hope that saying doesn't catch on for the ages."
 * Sepia ink is full of the sour taste of improperly cleaned squid. It is relaxing. Enlightening. Allows you to calmly drool on the floor.

Location or event-specific

 * Once you claim Ascension Hall and your first Spire, he will express surprise and elation at being so close to the events of the world - a change from his usual duty of merely observing history. He will also mention dates when other Edicts were broken. He will also comment on any subsequent activations.
 * When you travel to Haven and ask him about the area's history, he'll ask you to comment on governing the place if you chose Lethian's Crossing as your posting in the second year of the Conquest.
 * After dismantling two of three edicts, Lantry will interview you regarding what transpired, your feelings on the matter and your mental state - for posterity, of course.
 * After completing Act II and proclaiming the Edict, Lantry will mention that all of his writings on you are suddenly worth ten times more and... Elaborate on how they're going to make him popular with the ladies. He will also converse on the nature of the Overlord, history of Edicts, and the potential for... Solving you and the problem you pose.

Reputation

 * Favor
 * Appreciates concern, respect, and intelligence. It's easy to gain the first level of reputation with him just by showing concern for his health and genuine interest in him during your first meeting at the Camp.
 * Conquest:
 * Warn the Sages before you proclaimed the Edict of Fire (major).
 * Quests:
 * End the Edict of Stone.
 * Interactions
 * Ask Lantry about his health after liberating him at the camp (average).
 * Discuss mathematics with him in dialogue (talk about him, then ensure you have Lore 43 to listen to his lecture, major)
 * Fear
 * Appalled by rude, blustering ways.
 * This includes demanding an oath of fealty from him (average).
 * Quests
 * Tell him you only saved him to decode the missive.
 * Attack Tarkis Arri under the flag of truce when she asks you to meet her.
 * Tell him to pen a note to the Archons before sending Tarkis Arri on her merry way off the edge of the Spire (major).